ChurchillWildofferscloseencounters

OWNER-OPERATORS of Churchill Wild’s four eco-lodges, Mike and Jeanne Reimer have been leading 16-person polar bear viewing adventures for 23 years. Three out of their four lodges are on the shoreline of the vast western Hudson Bay in subarctic Manitoba. Jeanne grew up in the town of Churchill, 60 kilometres from the couple’s Seal River Heritage Lodge. The couple met and married when Mike worked as a guide for her parents’ fishing and hunting lodge, and together they founded the Churchill Wild adventure company (churchillwild.com). “Being able to meet guests from around the world, and to share this uniquely beautiful area with them and see them experience something that is so special, inspired us,” says Jeanne. One of few tours in the world that approaches the Arctic tundra on foot rather than in all-terrain tundra vehicles, Churchill Wild greatly lessens the carbon footprint and impact on the bears and other wildlife, explains Mike. The lodges are in a wildlife corridor with stunning vistas, he notes: “Location, location, location! We are living in the polar bears’ front yard.”